Bank of Montreal and Scotiabank hiked their residential mortgage rates yesterday, joining Royal Bank, TD Canada Trust and CIBC in increasing the cost of borrowing to buy a home.
The increases follow the Bank of Canada`s surprising decision to leave its benchmark overnight rate unchanged at 3 per cent, rather than lowering it by a quarter-point as most bank economists had expected.
TORONTO -- The Canadian real estate market is being flooded with homes, causing prices to start falling in some key markets, according to the Canadian Real Estate Association.
The average price of a home sold last month in the country`s top 25 markets was $337,071, an all-time record. But that record price was only up 1.1% from May, 2007 -- the smallest year-over-year increase in seven years.
OTTAWA -- Millions of Canadian commuters are changing the way they get to work rather than paying the price at the pump, according to an Ipsos-Reid poll conducted for Canwest News Service and Global National.
The poll, conducted this week as gas prices continue to rise, found that over the last six months 37 per cent of commuters were walking to work more and 31 per cent were switching to more gas-efficient vehicles.
A rash of recent reports paints a scary picture of Canadians as spending like drunken sailors, leading to the prickly question of whether we should be forced to save money.
A Statistics Canada study showed Canadians are now finding themselves with two mortgages and deeper in debt than at any time in their lives. They are increasingly house poor, and with housing values sliding, they often owe more on their properties than they`re worth.
No `Ninja` mortgages, but Canada gets more options
MONTREAL -- It`s difficult to imagine what lenders and brokers were thinking when they dreamed up the shaky mortgage products that set off the U.S. housing collapse.
Take the "Ninja" mortgage, for example. That`s the catchy phrase one lender used for the "No income, no job, no assets" home loan for which just about anyone could qualify. Other lenders offered "liar loans" that let borrowers merely state their incomes without producing backup documentation.
Getting into the market is easy, but coming out ahead isn`t
With just a couple of mouse clicks, anybody can play the stock market nowadays -- even a baby, according to a cheeky TV ad.
Discount online brokers and major financial institutions alike allow investors to buy and sell securities on the web -- sometimes for under $10 a transaction.
But while it may be cheap and easy to become an online trader, experts say, investors need to do their homework and exercise discipline if they want to avoid getting in over their heads.
OTTAWA -- The airlines appear to have won a major victory after quietly pressing their case that a law passed a year ago requiring them to advertise the full price of airfares is unfair.
Federal Transport Minister Lawrence Cannon has been under increasing pressure to explain why the government has yet to act on legislation requiring airlines to include fees and surcharges in all airfare advertisements rather than just one-way base fares.
Last month, I headed north to Edmonton to attend the wedding of my cousin`s daughter.
As with any wedding, one must think of what kind of gift to give the newlyweds and, unfortunately, I found myself the day before leaving for the Alberta capital wondering what to get them.
Past wedding gifts I had bestowed on other couples came to mind, including a portable hibachi (do they make them anymore?) and a lovely wall-mounted mirror that came complete with candle holders (I never did see this adorning any wall in the couple`s home on any of my visits ).
OTTAWA -- A private member`s bill introduced in the House of Commons Monday would require that cheque-cashing services protect the rights of consumers in the same way as banks and other mainstream financial institutions.
The goal of the bill, put forward by Vancouver East New Democrat MP Libby Davies, would be to prevent victims of fraud from being victimized a second time when they are unable to stop a payment to a con artist.
Rates have soared, again. What`s a homeowner to do? Think variable
Even the big boys are stumped by the question of what to do about mortgage rates right now.
Fixed-rate mortgages at the big banks soared late last week by as much as 0.85 of a percentage point, which, by the usual standards of rate changes, is somewhere between really, really big and humungous. When was the last time we saw such a significant shift in mortgage rates? Oh, a little less than a month ago, when banks cut their rates by as much as 0.85 of a point.
What makes these changes all the more confusing is that, exceptional as they are, they`re starting to look familiar. Early last summer, rates were set to rise because of strong economic growth and the need to keep inflation under control. Then financial markets came undone and rates were reined in to ease the strain. We then moved into a declining rate phase, where the concern was a slowing economy. Now, the rate outlook has changed yet again.
OTTAWA -- The gap between Canadian nursing graduates and demand stands at more than 2,500 nurses a year, according to figures to be released today at a national conference in Ottawa.
Canada had 9,447 new registered nurses last year, but needs 12,000 a year to address a projected nursing shortage, according to data to be presented to the 1,000 delegates at the Canadian Nurses Association conference.
MONTREAL -- Two years ago, Kyle MacDonald managed to barter a red paper clip into a two-storey home in a rural Saskatchewan town.
Now, the master trader is itching to move on, although he admits he has no idea what he can fetch for the three-bedroom, two-bathroom, fully furnished home on Main Street in Kipling, Sask.
The web-savvy former Montrealer says it is a tough decision to move, but the right one for himself and his wife. "I realized I didn`t just want to stay somewhere, I wanted to keep moving and keep trading," MacDonald, 28, said in an interview yesterday in Montreal.
EDMONTON - A recent column mentioning that the next nine months could be an optimal time to buy a house in the United States caused a couple of readers to warn of pitfalls.
RBC Asset Management senior portfolio manager Brad Willock suggested Canadians should thoroughly research U.S. properties, and noted that planeloads of Europeans are also arriving there with chequebooks in hand, anxious to take advantage of a depressed housing market.
Frequent flyer Sylvia Tessaro is always willing to pay extra if she can be guaranteed a direct flight to her destination.
"I pay more or use more points to go direct. I can`t stand the indirect flights," says the retired teacher from Toronto who recently returned from a direct flight from Shanghai after starting her overseas trek on Air Canada`s recently eliminated Toronto-Rome flight.
OTTAWA - Summertime, and the livin` is easy, but not like it used to be.
Separate reports released Tuesday reveal that summer is Canadians` favourite time to retire, although few mark the season with any special celebration, faced with a working life that now stretches into their so-called Golden Years.
And entrepreneurs who once looked forward to kicking back on the beach find their moment covered with sunscreen increasingly interrupted by the buzz of their BlackBerry.
World crude oil production has topped out at 85 million barrels per day even as demand keeps climbing, helping to drive a stunning surge in prices, billionaire oil investor T. Boone Pickens said Tuesday.
"I do believe you have peaked out at 85 million barrels a day globally," Pickens, who heads BP Capital hedge fund with more than $4 billion US under management, said during testimony to the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.
OTTAWA -- International investors` appetites for Canadian securities continued to grow in April, with purchases rising to the highest level since November 2006, Statistics Canada said yesterday.
"Foreign investment in both short-and long-term debt instruments rebounded, while equity investment continued at a strong pace," the federal agency said.
Investors from outside the country bought $9.75 billion in Canadian securities in April, it said. Most of those purchases were in government and private bonds.
Canadians are not only cutting the use of their cars following surging gasoline prices, but are also starting to change their food-buying habits in anticipation of higher food prices, according to a new poll.
"Buffeted by continuing increases in gas and energy prices, Canadians are also preparing to change their eating habits and how they shop for food," stated the analysis of the Investors Group poll, released yesterday.
Many of those polled say they are buying more local produce, giving up exotic or out-of-season fruits and vegetables, eating less meat and having more meals at home.
EDMONTON - As turning points in business go, a looming change in accounting standards doesn`t get the attention that Y2K got. It is accounting, after all.
But while it hasn`t made front-page news, Canada`s switch to new international accounting practices by Jan. 1, 2011, could cause headaches for companies that don`t get ready in time and confusion for some folks who invest in stocks.
"In any change, there might be an initial stage of denial," said Tim Forristal, vice-president of education for the Canadian Institute of Chartered Accountants.
International Trade Minister David Emerson will announce today the opening of 10 new trade promotion offices in three countries, including six in China, a country with which the Conservative government has had chilly political and commercial relations.
The openings in China will more than double the number of Canadian trade-promotion offices in that rapidly expanding, giant industrial economy, for a total of 11. The offices provide on-the-ground services to Canadian companies seeking to launch or expand trade ventures.
